How did this book reach me? Why are some books so hard to find, while others are always available? How does the work of those who distribute them—one of the last links in the long chain of booksellers—condition all participants in the publishing world? Through memory and experience, Víctor Malumián exposes the complex web of circumstances that define bookstores' catalogs, the survival of publishers, and the pleasure of readers.

“Somewhere in the middle of this dynamic involving publishers, readers, and authors, there is a simple, unnoticed, but fundamental issue, because without it, everything collapses. The possibility of the text being read collapses, every idea, every author, every bookseller collapses: if the book is not available, if, due to poor distribution, the book is not within reach of readers once it has been published, it cannot be bought and, therefore, cannot be read.” —Víctor Malumián

“My country is thin. Our neighbors, almost all of them colossi of millions of square kilometers, call us "the corridor" or "the fat of the steak" that is Argentina. It's more than 4,300 kilometers from north to south, from Arica to Puerto Williams, or from the desert to the icy end of the world. Think about what it would be like to carry a book from one end of this territory to the other: how long it takes, how much you travel, how much it costs, how many people are waiting for it." —Andrea Palet